According to a research conducted among 1349 emerging entrepreneurs with their companies below five years old by Harvard Business School in collaboration with consultancy firm EY during the past three decades found that a sense of purpose is often important to winning customers over, largely so because then you find a reason to do so. The another important aspect of having a vision or purpose is that it motivates people in the team to deliver their best.
There is a prevalent understanding out there that a sense of purpose helps build sustainable companies. There are studies that found out that founders and companies who have a purpose bigger than money and who go back-to-basics often succeed in the long run.
In an interview with Future Startup, Brain Station 23 CEO, Raisul Kabir told the exact same thing. He attributed a lot of the early success of Brain Station to having a bold vision that helped him retain best people despite the fact that they’re not paying the highest salary:
“The thing that helped us very much during our early days was our vision. We started Brain Station for a reason which was way bigger than money or any material goal. We had a common vision. We wanted to achieve something bigger than ourselves as opposed to building a mere business. As a result, everyone in the company was happy and used to feel empowered and part of something bigger.”
The way we humans are designed is fascinating. We operate in a counterintuitive manner. Our brain enjoys solving difficult problems, as opposed to the conventional idea that we like to work less hard. We work harder when we find something worth solving. Then we like to be a part of something that goes beyond us and that is bigger than ourselves. Brain Station started with a vision to create employment opportunities for talented software engineers while also earning foreign currency for the country through outsourcing that effectively helped a bunch of talented people to come together and invest their everything to propel that vision:
“People usually want to be a part of something noble. We had that thing. As a result, people used to stay with us for a long time. Our employee turnover rate is very low. Our first employee stayed with us til the day he left the country for Germany. It is not like that we pay a huge salary. We do pay good salary but we are not the highest paying company. We pay better than average companies but we have consciously made the decision that we will never be the highest paying company because we don’t want people to come and work for Brain Station 23 for money rather for the cause and passion. We want people who are ready to sacrifice for the vision we have.”
“Why’ is the most important question to ask, as Simon Sinek put and you should always start with asking why you are doing what you are doing. Most people start companies with either a false sense of purpose or with superficial one, neither helps. While starting a company, think and invest in finding out what problem that you are trying to solve, what is your purpose and why you and your team should dedicate your time in building it.
